Bad back good luck for analyst

Posted: Thursday, February 01, 2001

Skip BaylessChicago Tribune

Soon after the small jet landed back in Stillwater, Okla., Tim Dirato thanked his lucky stars and coach Eddie Sutton for letting him switch from the "slow plane." Their pilot was getting sketchy reports that it had suffered mechanical problems and had to land.

"With my (bad) back," Dirato told Sutton, "the last thing I needed was stopping two hours in Pueblo for a new headlight."

Dirato, Oklahoma State's radio analyst for nearly 30 years, had taken "the slow plane," a twin-engine King Air 200, up to Colorado the day before. The twin degenerative disks in his 56-year-old back had grown increasingly angry during the one-hour 45-minute flight.

"The slow plane" carried the Cowboys' support personnel. Two others also provided by boosters-two eight-passenger jets-whisked players and coaches up to Boulder in little more than an hour. Sutton took one look at Dirato's postflight pain and told him not to worry, he would return via jet.

"He's my best friend," Dirato said by phone. "If you know him, he'd do anything for you. But it didn't seem like a big thing at the time."

God only knew that Dirato's bad back-and Sutton's good heart-had just cost 21-year-old Daniel Lawson his life. Lawson came to Stillwater by way of Detroit's Mackenzie High and Michigan's Mott Community College. His minutes had fallen lately-he played only five in Saturday's 81-71 loss to Colorado-and he was in danger of losing his scholarship next season.

This dropped him into much greater danger. Like most coaches, Sutton runs his team by a pecking order based on tenure, performance. Seniors and producers get first dibs. Lawson switched with Dirato-although his family says he did so without complaint.

Assistant coach Kyle Keller made a more customary switch with his cousin by marriage, Nate Fleming, a freshman walk-on called the team's "Rudy." Fleming, who always got last dibs, returned on the "slow plane" so Keller could join the other coaches to critique the loss. Sutton and Dirato were home before they heard the "slow plane" had gone down 40 miles east of Denver. Now both are in for soul-searching.

Sutton, nearing 65, has been to two Final Fours and to hell and back, overcoming a taste for whiskey that helped cut short his stint at Kentucky. But even that didn't quite prepare him for "by far the hardest thing I've ever done"-making late-night calls to the families of all 10 victims.

Lawson's father, already unhappy with Sutton for cutting his son's playing time, was far less pleased that the coach allowed the King Air flight to take off in light snow with 11/2-mile visibility. Daniel Lawson Sr., a retired postal worker, told The Detroit News: "The coaching staff shouldn't have exposed my son to this kind of peril."

But Sutton told reporters Tuesday night he has "no guilt" about switching Dirato and Lawson and no second thoughts about letting the prop plane take off. "I feel much safer in a King Air (plane) than behind the wheel of my car," Sutton said. "I've flown thousands of miles in one. It's safer than a jet if it's in tip-top shape, and this one was. (Pilot) Denver Mills is the best I've ever flown with. Many times he has said, 'We better not go coach.' This time he said it would be fine."

What shouldn't be fine with parents of student-athletes across the country is the rising practice of letting boosters provide their planes to transport teams to remote game sites. This saves considerable money and class time. But how can a coach know for sure if each plane and pilot are in "tip-top shape"? Oklahoma State's "Air Force" changes almost every trip. The wreckage spread over a mile of snow-covered hillside just as easily could have been the jet carrying Sutton.

Ask Payne Stewart's widow. The silver lining is so many teams fly so many miles so safely.

Ask families of the other victims if they think Sutton would put their loved ones in greater jeopardy than himself. Broadcaster Bill Teegins was "like a brother" to Sutton and assistant sports information director Will Hancock was "like a son," Dirato said. Hancock's father, Bill, runs the NCAA basketball tournament. So Dan Lawson, bless him, was in good company.

Still Dirato can't understand "why someone 56 would be spared over someone just beginning life."

Hard to know. But it probably will be a while before he complains about his back.